My Gaming Autumn - Tough Choices

We all know that this Fall has some awesome games coming out, if they haven't already. Everybody's anticipating the likes of Skyrim, already enjoying the hell out of Arkham City, or Battlefield 3, or Gears of War 3.

Unless you're filthy rich, in which case I'd marry you for your mon..I mean love, you're not going to be able to buy all the awesome titles that are coming out this Fall. A relatively frugal gamer is going to have to make some choices. Obviously, that choice is helped if you don't like a particular type of game (I avoided action games like Arkham City like the plague until Arkham Asylum got me hooked), but for the most part, you've got some tough decisions to make.

The first part of the year is usually pretty empty, though next year is actually not looking that way with Mass Effect 3 and Bioshock: Infinite coming out. But next year, I do plan to buy at least a couple of these games that I'm skipping.

This is the first major game I have purchased this year. I wanted to get it because I love the whole Nathan Drake storyline, and because of the almost cinematic experience that the game gives. This series gives me the same goosebumps that the Indiana Jones movies did (at least before watching some of them...yes, I'm looking at you, Crystal Skull). This is a game I wanted to experience with the multitude of friends who would be playing it, rather than waiting for it.

There's also the added benefit of it being a PS3 exclusive, and I just bought a new PS3! Have to put it through its paces, right?

I'm half-way through the game, and really enjoying it. Though Nathan does sometimes move like he's drunk, and a couple of the chase sequences have wonky camera angles that make them harder than they should be.

I'm also looking forward to playing this online with some of my friends, though I sadly missed the Frag-Fest last night.

This is a game I was always going to be getting, and I guess you could say that waiting would have been ok because everybody was going to be playing it even in the new year. I just wanted to get in on the ground floor and not start from so far behind everybody else, though. I haven't played an online game in a while now, and I'm itching to get back to it.

I have no problem with anybody who prefers Battlefield 3 over Call of Duty (though if you bring your fanboyishness attitude back in response to this, I'll be greatly disappointed). It's just a personal preference that I want to try this one out of the gate first. I'm looking forward to finishing the story and to some great multiplayer.

This is another one that I just have to finish the story to! The promise that Ezio's story is finally coming to an end was a dealbreaker for me. I want to experience this story as soon as it comes out. I don't want to chance it being spoiled, and I want to be able to commiserate with my friends about it once we're all done with it. That, and it sounds like it has some great multiplayer as well. I didn't play much of it, but I did really like the Brotherhood multiplayer. I'm looking to enjoy this one as well.

Yes, it's a car that sucks up people (and yourself, if you want) and uses them as live ammunition! Not to mention a gun that shoots baby octopi at people so that they attach themselves to the heads and turn an enemy into somebody fighting on your side.

How can you go wrong?

This game is also being purchased first day because it's so damned fun (or at least the first two were, and everything I've heard says the third game is even more so), and because my wife gets a kick out of watching me do the Insurance Fraud missions. And a happy wife is a wife who doesn't complain too much when I'm hogging the TV playing games.

That's four games at $60 a piece. You do the math.

There were some reasons why a game was excluded as well. I don't have 100+ hours to sink into Skyrim right now, and it has no multiplayer for people to abandon by the time I get to it, so that game can wait until next year. Yes, I'm aware that this means I will be buying two time sinks in the first part of next year. I'm bracing myself for it.

Making the choices I did, the last month and a half has been really hard, watching my fellow gamers revel in the thrills of the games they've picked up and played. Twitter was rife with tweets about how wonderful Arkham City was. I saw my friends getting achievements on Gears of War 3. I watched the back and forth about Battlefield 3, and realized that this decision was actually the easiest, since I do shooters on the Xbox and don't have room to install the game (server issues and the diluted graphics made me not regret that choice at all).

I knew my time was coming, though, and now that November is here, I get to immerse myself in gaming goodness along with everybody else. It's going to be a busy month! But it's good to be back with my friends, talking the same language as they are again.